Antioch-area man charged in domestic slaying

An Antioch man has been charged with murder in the death of his teenage daughter's mother after the daughter called police when the couple had a fight Thursday night, authorities said.

Michael S. Axtell, 41, is being held in Lake County Jail in lieu of $3 million bail this morning in the slaying of Tammy L. Stone, 40, who lived with Axtell in the 26000 block of West Bond Avenue near Antioch, according to a release from the Lake County Sheriff's Office.

The 19-year-old daughter of Stone and Axtell called 911 after she had gone to the Bond Avenue address when Stone called her because she and Axtell were having a fight.

When the daughter got to the house with her friends, she found her mother with a left eye that had been blackened, and the daughter and Axtell got into a fight about Stone's condition, police said.

The daughter went into a detached garage at the house, then heard a "suspicious noise," according to the release. She and her friends went back in the house and found Stone unresponsive.

Police were called, and Lake County Sheriff's Deputies arrived at the scene to find Stone in her bedroom, unresponsive. She was taken to Northern Illinois Medical Center in Crystal Lake where she was declared dead.

An autopsy by the McHenry County coroner's office made the preliminary finding that Stone died of blunt force trauma to the head, authorities said. McHenry County performed the autopsy because Stone was declared dead at a McHenry County hospital.

Axtell fled the scene before police arrived but was found and arrested not far from his home soon after the attack, said Lake County Sheriff's Deputy Chief Wayne S. Hunter. Axtell is scheduled to appear in Lake County Court on Oct. 25.